Love and Terror

By Dorothy Weil

"I've always enjoyed Dorothy Weil's novels with their salty depictions of midwestern life. LOVE AND TERROR is Weil's best to date, gritty, suspenseful, humorous and wise."
Stephen Birmingham,
author of OUR CROWD and over twenty
best-selling novels and social histories.

In LOVE AND TERROR a family battles with illness, war, and tumultous cultural changes. Every reader will recognize incidents and attitudes in their own lives. The novel is infused with sharp insight, sharp repartee, sharp humor, and beautifully developed characters. Read it! You will be reminded and rewarded in ways you never contemplated."
Ceil Cleveland,
author of WHATEVER HAPPENED TO JACY FARROW? THE BLUEBOOK SOLUTION
and SHORT STORIES UNZIPPED.
Founding editor of COLUMBIA MAGAZINE.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Nov 18, 2013
• ISBN: 9781491826942

Dorothy Weil

Dorothy Weil grew up on river boats as the daughter of a steamboat captain. She is the author of seven books, including a comic novel bought by Disney Productions. She has worked for many years as a free lancer, publishing in periodicals throughout the country, and she has served as writer-producer with TV IMAGE, INC., a production team winning many national awards. She has a studio near her home where she paints and shows her art and photography. Cover art by Janice Forberg, Prasada Press

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© 2013, 2014 Dorothy Weil. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 12/20/2013

ISBN: 978-1-4918-2696-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-2695-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-2694-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013918470

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Part 1 Sudden Death

1 Judith

2 David

3 Judith

4 William

5 David

6 Judith

7 David

8 Judith

9 David

10 William

11 Betsy

12 Judith

Part 2 When Reason Sleeps

13 Judith

14 Judith

15 David

16 Judith

17 Judith

18 William

19 Judith

20 John

21 Judith

22 Betsy

23 David

24 Judith

Part 3 Queen of Hearts

25 Judith

26 Judith

27 Judith

28 Judith

29 Judith

30 Judith

31 Judith

32 Betsy

Part 4 Knife Edge

33 William

34 David

35 William

36 David

37 John

38 Betsy

39 Judith

Part 5 Scalpel

40 The Howards

Part 6 Open Hearts

41 David

42 Judith

43 David

44 Betsy

45 David

46 William

47 Judith

Part 7 Proud Flesh

48 Betsy

49 David

50 Judith

51 William

52 William

53 Judith

54 William

55 Judith

56 Betsy

57 Judith

Part 8 Scar Tissue

58 David

59 Judith

60 William

61 Judith

62 William

63 Judith

64 Betsy

65 Judith

66 Betsy

67 Judith

68 Betsy

Part 9 Heart Chambers

69 David

70 David

71 William

72 Judith

73 Betsy

74 Judith

75 John

Acknowledgements

About the Author

To my wonderful family and friends

And in memory of Janice Forberg whose art graces the cover of this book

The person, gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid

—Jane Austen

American history is longer, larger, more various, more beautiful, and more terrible than anything anyone has ever said about it

—James Baldwin

Part 1

Sudden Death

1

Judith

A t the Romanos’ swimming party for the history faculty, after too many margaritas, she jumped into the pool topless. Down under the surface, she cooled off, refreshed by the water beneath her breasts. She sobered up enough to hear laughter coming from the poolside. Oh God! This was Cincinnati! Her husband was head of the department! She wondered how to get out of the water without further exposure. She swam a few lengths as several of the men cheered; finally she was saved by her hostess who placed a large towel by the edge of the pool.

She was one of the first generation of women to have the pill and women’s lib. They were supposed to change the world. But here she was, brilliant, successful Dr. Judith Howard, at loose ends and having an old-fashioned identity crisis, while her sister Moira, who had gotten into drugs, drink, and sleazy men, had a good job and a nice condo in DC. Cliffside College where Judith had taught English for a decade had closed; couldn’t compete with the expanding grasp of the universities with their big name architects, their attractive grounds and luxurious student suites. Her body had turned on her. Sudden clammy sweats kept her awake at night, and drenched her clothes. She had wedged an ice bag into her evening purse at one of the university’s grand balls.

If Eric went ahead with his aim to head the university and God forbid succeeded, her life would be an endless round of cocktail parties, teas, dinners, football, sucking up to donors—all the things she hated. Why was he interested in the job? That didn’t sound like her old Eric.

Anger had taken over their home like an uninvited relative, an invalid aunt demanding attention and service. Where had she come from? Whose family was she?

Their sex life veered from a wild lovemaking to lying as far apart on the bed as possible, like figures on a sarcophagus.

At Christmas Judith received a letter from her eleven year old niece, Moira’s daughter:

Dear Aunt Judy, thanks for the cool sweater. I hope you’re having a wonderful Christmas like when I visited you. Your home was so beautiful and you were like a beautiful princess. I wished I could live with you. Love, Zelda.

Judith was trying to convince Eric to go with her to a marriage counselor at the time. His typical expression of emotion was cool irony, and she needed something he couldn’t or wouldn’t give: the part withheld that flew the skies in his small plane. He said People don’t change. He was so willing to let things slide, to accept things as they were.

Then why did we march against the Viet Nam war, and get tear-gassed for it, and protest against going into Iraq? she said. Why are we working so hard to defeat Bush? You think you can change the whole world, but not one individual. While he studied the history of the world, he had little interest in hers, or his own.

Nothing changed, and Judith could not go on pulling rebellious stunts. She decided to take a job in DC at one of the universities she’d applied to; it was only a a one-semester lectureship teaching Jane Austen’s novels, but it was a prestigious offer.

You can get a new job here, Eric argued.

Like she hadn’t looked.

Maybe he didn’t know how rare positions in English studies were; maybe he hadn’t noticed women in their fifties were being cut from jobs, not being hired for them. Judith’s colleague, a fellow Ph.D, was answering the phone at a local community center.

Judith was lost in her old Tudor house, the rooms echoing with dreams and memories. She had worked hard for her degree—(she remembered once writing a paper with a bottle of wine in one hand and a pen in the other). She didn’t want to think about William… Or her mother.

Maybe some time apart would be good for her and Eric.

What would she have done if he had said, Please don’t go. I need you?

He said, You have to do what you have to do.

When they quarreled, he held out his hands—not to embrace her, but as though to tamp down a fire.

When she came to DC for her job, Moira asked her how she could be sure Eric wouldn’t get involved with another woman.

How can he be sure I won’t find another man? she quipped.

Eric once admitted that the women in his classes, young and leggy and adoring, were tempting, and one tucked her panties into his jacket hanging on his office coat tree. But he wasn’t stupid enough to mess around with students. A member of City Council arrived at Judith’s door one afternoon: would she help him with a paper he was trying to write? A neighbor tried to talk her into bed. There were others, but they were too dumb.

Judith looked in Moira’s cheval mirror. Her eyes, which she considered her best feature, were large, with thick brows. People said they looked as though they were painted on. Eric had always liked her eyes. Her body was firm, courtesy of yoga, which Eric made fun of, and bicycling which he shared. It was hour-glassy, not the popular pipe-stem thin.

Moira assessed Judith’s reflection, and said, You’re pretty cocky. But hey, if tits and ass are really what it’s all about, you should be the most popular girl in town. Your hair, though: a stork could nest in it.

Settled in now, Judith looks out the window of her office at the university in DC. It’s a beautiful September day. The students are playing Frisbee on the well-manicured green. She glances at a poster on her wall: Art is the education of the feelings. Her mantra.

In her own life, the only place she ever heard the truth was in fiction. She thought the sexiest line in literature was Mr. Darcy’s What think you of books?

She wants her students to read, read, read—great works of imagination.

Her students have changed over the years, become celebrity worshipers, shoppers, and lovers of violence. Narcissists glued to their Ipods and BlackBerrys, and God knows what future gadgets, shrinking the human heart into something small and dried up.

It can be repaired, she thinks. It can.

That is why, even at the somewhat late age she completed her Ph.D, she chose the craziest and least marketable degree.

And has taken a temporary post.

Where she and Eric are going, she has no idea. They’ve gotten together several times over the months she has been gone from home. They talked, but just carried on with the status quo. Sparred a round, then gone back to their corners.

Maybe it would all work out.

It had been an instantaneous, complete, falling in love: two Chicago wunderkind.

She just needed to get back up on her feet—get her pride back.

Judith’s cell rings. Eric. She is so surprised.

I was just thinking of you, she says.

He tells her he is going to the hospital to get a long-postponed knee replacement.

Why didn’t you call me before? Do you need me to come out?

They were polite, did the decent thing. Most of the time.

No need, he says. It’s routine. David is picking me up in a bit. It’s no big deal.

Well, it is, she says. I feel terrible.

She wonders if that could be the point of his not telling her—make her feel guilty? Eric had never been a dirty fighter. But of course, she thinks, our motives are often hidden from our more acceptable selves, out of sight like paintings turned to the wall.

She wishes him well. Should she go home even though he said not to? His surgery is routine. Everybody she knows has had a hip or a knee replaced. Still… .

Don’t worry, Eric says. David will call later.

Judith has difficulty settling down. If Eric did not want her to come out, why didn’t he wait until after the surgery to call her? It would be good to see him no matter what. When not with him, she always cools off.

She loves the guy!

She misses his body, his sense of humor, his confidence, his independence.

Last year, driving home from the Romanos’ swimming party, she thought he would be furious.

I’m sorry for making a fool of myself, and embarrassing you, she said. I’m sure I shocked everybody.

Oh fuck ’em, Eric said. They got a free show.

His shortcomings were never about freedom of expression.

2

David

W hy did his father say not to call his mother? Was it Natalie? What’s going on ?

First his mother goes off to DC to teach, then his father starts with this girl. David thinks this kind of stuff is more for people his and Lydia’s age, who God knows are having their problems… .

He steers his BMW past the great bronze Genius of Water monument on Fountain Square. It is still in place in spite of many changes to the downtown; the Lady at the top still holds out her arms flowing with water, as she always has since he was a kid, since before his grandparents were born. It’s vaguely reassuring. He passes Music Hall, a great monster of a place where his grandfather is on the symphony board.

David thinks about the case he is in the middle of. He has subpoenaed the other side’s emails, but they demanded a few days to produce them. He knows what the delay is all about: associates scrambling to erase their porn.

David needs like hell to win this case. He isn’t a big money magnet for his law firm. He hates searching out and buttering up potential clients, and he detests golf. So he hopes becoming a top litigator will pave his way to making partner.

His ultimate ambition is to be a lawyer like Joseph Welch or Clarence Darrow, fighting political bullies and ignorance. If his father were a lawyer instead of a history professor, he would be going after giant corporations and defending civil rights cases. David will be like his heroes. Eventually. For now he must concentrate on money and paying off his and Lydia’s debts. Though together they pull down over two hundred grand a year at their firms, they are up to their necks in debt.

He soon reaches the university area where he grew up. A friend called the neighborhood Brigadoon because he thought it looked as though time had passed it by while it slept.

What era did it fall asleep in? David asked.

The fifties.

David’s father was born here, and David had lived here most of his life. Their old Tudor house is within walking distance of the strip of stores, the too-tiny public library, the movie theater (being revived as an art theater after a period of smelling like pee and endless showings of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre), the apartment building with sagging wooden porches, the ethnic clothing shops, the Cincinnati Chili parlor.

The only big changes since David was a kid are the closing of the hardware store and the appearance of four Indian restaurants.

Except for the lights of the movie theater, the area is grayish, a little dowdy, very different from the mall where he and Lydia drive for shopping—which has everything from two humongous supermarkets to the Gap, Old Navy, several pricey restaurants, Whole Foods—Whole Paycheck David calls it.

As he nears his old home he happily breathes in the smell of Indian spices and chili. Huge old trees line the thoroughfare to the residential area, streets where ordinary places like his parents’ sit side by side with twenty-room houses and even a few actual castles built by the old-time beer barons, his grandparents’ former home among them. He and William had a blast there as kids, running around the bell tower playing medieval knights.

As David pulls into the driveway of the Tudor, a shower of walnuts rain down on his car from the monstrous volunteer tree his father has vowed to cut down since David was in high school. The dark brown front door is open and his father steps into the outer hall. He looks at his watch, then turns and picks up a fuzzy black and white suitcase David remembers from his childhood. The Howards don’t embrace change easily.

Nevertheless, David notices his father is dressed in a pricey-looking leather jacket, flannel trousers and an open collar shirt. A contrast to his casual outfits of T-shirts and white socks with black shoes. Maybe the new look is courtesy of Natalie—who’s close to William’s age for God’s sake.

His father is looking at his watch.

David says, We’ve got plenty of time.

No problem.

David looks at the house while his father gets into the car. He and William had enjoyed a happy childhood in this old Tudor mess. He prefers it to his McMansion, which William calls the place that he and Lydia live in—to Lydia’s annoyance. It is in a subdivision where all the neighbors are young and white, have wine cellars, and get married in St. Tropez.

In the car, David slips Hard Rain into the deck, something both and he and his father can enjoy.

The drive to the hospital is not far, but near the university the traffic thickens, and David pulls into a lane with a car on his right that he didn’t see. He jerks the car back into his own lane.

Jesus Christ, his father says.

We’re OK.

David thinks, maybe he’s taking this operation harder than he’s let on. It is David’s mother who habitually gasps and presses an imaginary brake in traffic. His Dad would be silent. When David and William were kids, any complaint their father had about them would wait until they were at home and then the misdemeanor would be organized and delivered in the clear reasonable tone of one of his history lectures.

William once said, Would you just hit me?

Is his father doing this operation for Natalie? He had been limping for quite awhile in pain and David’s mother had suggested replacement many times, but he’d resisted, tried shots and practiced denial.

The hospital takes up six or eight blocks on one of the city’s seven hills, in a neighborhood of once elegant homes, now offices or apartments with fire escapes. The entrance door opens automatically and an eerie voice says, Welcome to Good Shepard Hospital. This is a non-smoking facility. Please observe the no-smoking rule.

After the usual form-signing and card-displaying, proofs of insurance and identity, David and his father are taken to a small room where a nurse weighs the patient and takes his medical history. He sheepishly admits to having smoked for some thirty years.

Then a tall, rather too jovial doctor comes in and talks about anesthesia.

David’s father signs the necessary papers and the nurse pitches a backless blue gown on the table and leaves the room. David looks over the McCullough book he has brought, while his father undresses and puts on the gown. They wait.

What’s that you’re reading?

David hands his father the book.

I’d like to look it over. Soon as I can read.

I’ll leave it in the room. I think you’ll be groggy the rest of today. I was from my colonoscopy.

Aren’t you young for one of those?

They have to pay off the machines.

David’s father chuckles. Right you are.

The nurse comes in and gives him a shot.

They sit. David looks at his father, perched on the examining table. He is well-built and strong, full of energy. He has always looked good. With his slim build, thick brown hair, noble nose, large blue eyes, he could easily pass for less than his fifty-some years. One of David’s young women colleagues who had studied American History with his father said he was really hot.

David is not unhappy that people think he resembles his father.

He wonders again about the rift or whatever between him and his mother. No one had predicted it and the Howards do not mind one another’s business. Is it mid-life crisis? It is appearing in his parents’ generation in one form or another it seems. Lots of divorces. Affairs. Sudden purchases of sports cars.

David’s father drums his fingers on his thighs.

What in the hell are we waiting for? he says.

You know hospitals.

He pulls his gown around him.

This plastic seat is damned cold.

In the backless blue gown, David’s father looks for the first time ever, a little vulnerable, and a feeing of tenderness comes over David—for this paragon, this giant figure in his and William’s life: the professor with a wall full of awards, a shelf of books with his name on them, head of his department with a shot at being the next president of the university.

His voice is growing slurred.

David gets up and looks into the hall.

You don’t have to stay, his father says.

I’m fine. David had hoped his impatience to get back to work hadn’t shown.

They wait some more. His father’s eyes are closing.

Pretty soon an orderly comes in, a man in blue scrubs. David’s father is very groggy now and David kisses him on the cheek.

Break a leg, Pop, he says, or rather—I guess you kind of did that already.

David’s father waves weakly and the orderly rolls him onto a gurney. David walks alongside it as they guide it down what seems like endless hallways and into and out of elevators. At the door to the operating area, the orderly indicates that David has gone as far as he may and directs him to a waiting room.

David tries to get comfortable in an arm chair. He looks at his watch. They are about on schedule. He reads the lead stories in Time. More American troops killed, more Iraqis dead. The world is a god damned mess: a stupid unprovoked war going on, horrible torture at the Abu Ghraib prison camp. He can barely look at the photos of the naked men abused and humiliated. By Americans.

The whole Howard clan had protested when Bush announced the war downtown at Union Terminal. Why had they, ordinary citizens, known the whole thing was phony when the Times and the rest of the media fell for it? Gone to sleep, gone along.

David’s father had helped plan the march.

David thumbs through the magazine to the features, and skims an article on tweens. Apparently this is a hot market, hyping the right labels and diets for girls not yet teenagers. Well, who is he to talk? He and Lydia had made sure Phoebe had the right stroller, the right crib, etc. Still, he doesn’t want Phoebe, at seven, to become a tween. He had named her after Holden Caulfield’s bright little sister in The Catcher in the Rye.

David thinks about going to the lobby for something to eat, but the only food place there is Wendy’s. He and Lydia avoid junk food, especially for Phoebe, but for themselves as well: e coli, avian flu, carcinogens.

David wonders how his father’s surgery is going.

Where is William? He said he would be over to wish his father well and stay with him after the operation. William, his baby brother, the talented one, the prodigal. Everybody’s darling.

Interrupting David’s thoughts, a nurse comes into the room, looks around and comes over to him. His father’s surgery was successful, she says, and he is being moved to a private room.

Relieved—the Howard luck is holding up—David follows the nurse down several long corridors.

He finds his father in a small room with sunlight shining at the window. He sits in a chair with a blanket over his knees.

David sits in a chair opposite him, with a nurse standing by.

How’s it goin’? he says.

His father smiles weakly.

Legs feel a little numb.

Want some water, Mr. Howard? the nurse says.

I—

David notices him begin to shake. The nurse slams the water pitcher on its tray and races to David’s father. She takes his wrist, rushes to the wall and presses a button.

David sits frozen, staring into his father’s eyes. There is no life in them.

What’s happening? David says.

The nurse is shouting, Mr. Howard! Mr. Howard!

3

Judith

S he goes to the lunch room and drinks a cup of coffee and reads the Post . She looks through the ads for a longer-term rental. She must get out of the expensive monthly place she is in.

A student, a boy she has spent hours coaching in the importance of clear, accurate language, plops down opposite her and asks for ideas for his Rhetoric paper. She suggests George Orwell. Think about the weaselly words our government is using to divert us from what is going on in Iraq—like ‘collateral damage’ to mean civilian deaths.

George Orwell? he says.

When Judith returns to her office, she checks her voice mail. David. He says Eric has gotten his surgery. Please call. He sounds upset. Oh my God, she thinks. She tries to call David, but gets no answer.

Judith takes a stack of student essays from her briefcase. She rifles through them. It is hard to think of anything else with David’s words reverberating in her mind. Could something be wrong?

Judith looks out the window. The sun is still shining on the perfect grass. The students are gone, back in class. Eric has always been so healthy, she thinks. In January he went hiking in the Rockies with colleagues. Besides flying his own plane; he plays tennis every week indoors or out. He is the strongest person she knows.

Judith calls her home number in Cincinnati and gets the recorded message. Eric hasn’t changed the wording. It is still "Eric and Judith here. We will call you right back."

She tries William’s cell, but of course he never remembers to turn it on.

4

William

H e started his day at the scuffed wooden bar of the Bookshelf Coffee Shop and Bar, having his regular cup of coffee and raisin bagel. He enjoyed the cozy atmosphere created by the shelves of old paperbacks and art books, the smell of hazelnut and the hiss of the cappuccino machine. He felt pretty satisfied from last night’s romp with Angie (he liked the way her hair kinked when she undid her long braid and it spread on the pillow like light brown waves).

He studied the art on the walls: charcoals of a small child on crutches in front of a bombed out building, an Iraqi man carrying a wounded girl. The work of yet another earnest artist preaching to the choir.

William knew all the regulars getting their morning caffeine fix.

How’d it go last night? he asked Hattie.

Not bad. Hattie glanced over at the darkened nook where she performed with a Blue Grass foursome several nights a week, singing and playing the guitar. She dunked her scone into her café au lait.

Anymore, kids want hip-hop, she said. Her Tennessee accent was twangy as her guitar. Or New Grass.

Jimmy, the barista, noticed William’s cup was low. He put aside his Vampirella comic and poised the coffee pot over the cup. He was jumpy as a Chihuahua. His hair was the color of white gold.

William checked his watch: he was supposed to meet David at the hospital, but the group of kids he read to at the Lookout Literacy Center was meeting unexpectedly due to a teacher in-service day. He would have to be late. William gulped down his coffee, refused the offer of more.

See you all later.

The others at the bar waved: Hattie, Mel, whose bakery was the best in town, Velma and her partner Ariel, filmmakers working on a documentary about the neighborhood riots.

Walking to The Lookout, William chose his route carefully; the secret of living in Cincinnati’s Over the Rhine, so-named for its German background, was knowing which corners and streets to avoid. Like Constitution where the gangs were in charge. He passed St. Mary’s church, one of the oldest in the city. The stained-glass windows were covered by plywood boards.

Other places were still boarded up from the riots, mixed in with open businesses. The people, furious at the police for shooting a young black man, had not touched the art store that had been in its location forever, or Smitty’s Men and Boys Shop, displaying red slacks, silky shirts and wide-brimmed hats in windows glittering with blinking lights. William never saw Smitty’s clothes actually worn; the street people wore black hoodies and baggy slacks. He figured Smitty’s outfits must be reserved for dances or funerals, or the club the police were always threatening to close down.

At Washington Park William saw his friend Reverend Allen, who must be in his eighties by now, leading a small group of sign-carriers demanding U.S. Out of Iraq. William waved, gave the thumbs up sign. Reverend Al was back on the streets having just gotten out of jail for climbing a fence at the White House to protest the Iraq war and the imminent re-election of Bush (if